ROCKBOX BOILING POINT
I pride myself on keeping up to the cutting edge and parallel the leading trends. That of course is elegant double speak for.. if it's cool...it is here. LOL
OK...to the point.
The trend is to make a self contained box that can be put in front of any passable sounding amp with the tone of it set as clean and as neutral as possible and you will get an uncanny feeling that you are actually playing some either classic or very expensive tube amp.
This is where the market is going and since it allows the player to set everything in his pedal rig to unity gain adding more and more pedals of any kind allow for their practical use. In short you can go from crystal clean to Metal Distortion and then over to a medium OD etc, without the volume leaping all over the place.
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Current Price $199.00 USD |
OLD SCHOOL
So what is the Boiling Point all about. Well it is old school. One sets up the best amp they can afford ...puts the gain up to to breakup...then backs it off a hair ...and gets some basic crunch. One then turns the guitar volume down a bit for clean. Next...to get that just right lead/solo excitement in one's tone...one uses an old school Tube Screamer or one of now many choices to get that exciting sound that a bit more boost and distortion can achieve.
'That sound' is a very subjective sound...these pedals are not trying to clone an actual specific amp.
They are simply trying to make the maximum workable sound, the best of these are sometimes incredibly natural and musical. They sound very REAL. they are part of your sound not an added effect.
So...this is a traditional approach so the market is much smaller...and when something new comes along only word of mouth gets it around. The bigger companies and the "Super Cool' companies have abandoned this approach
UNDERGROUND KING
The BOILING POINT is the well deserved leader of the pack. Not really a big seller since most of these kind of pedals are being sold to a lot of new players who will end up with a Tube Screamer or something like it. Maybe a Klon or a Timmy or even a King of Tone or one of many well known high profile brands. Brands that start with a ts808 Tube Screamer schematic then give it their own personal bends and twists.
It has a bass boost that works best with single coils and a 3 way diode switch which gives you a choice of which area of harmonics you want to boost.The mids are huge. One of the 3 settings will keep the mids from muddying depending on your rig.The overall tone is very warm, fat and middy.
It leans towards a Brit sound but nothing overly definable...a bit Plexi I suppose?
I do not review these pedals because there are dozens...but since this reached 'top dog' in this catagory and has held onto it for a few years I thought it was worth a listen.
Personally I prefer the Analog Man King Of Tone's little brother the Prince of Tone as it works well with a lot of other OD'S in the modern approach of using everything at unity gain even though it was initially not designed to.
If you are more into a straight forward blues influenced style with just one OD this however could be perfect.
You may not see some big Star with one ...but if you go from club to seedy club the working weekender has one or knows all about them.
It gets my vote since they respectfully painted it green. LOL
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